Reptile Fight Club - Does Lineage Really Matter? A Wolf/Hunt Joint

Episode Date: October 21, 2022

In this episode, Justin and Chuck tackle the question, does lineage matter? With Phil Wolf and Billy Hunt.  Who will win? You decide. Reptile Fight Club!Follow Justin Julander @Australian Addiction Reptiles-http://www.australianaddiction.comFollow Chuck Poland  on IG @ChuckNorriswinsFollow MPR Network on:FB: https://www.facebook.com/MoreliaPythonRadioIG: https://www.instagram.com/mpr_network/YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCtrEaKcyN8KvC3pqaiYc0RQMore ways to support the shows.Swag store: https://teespring.com/stores/mprnetworkPatreon: https://www.patreon.com/moreliapythonradio

Welcome to the episode of Reptile Fight Club. I'm Justin Julander, and here with me, Mr. Chuck Poland. What is up? Hey, dude. How you doing? I'm doing i'm doing good doing good nice a little tired but i woke up at like are you four this morning i couldn't get back to sleep so you gotta you hung out with the geckos you you don't get up at four o'clock in the morning i'm not like you man i'm not like you you should try it i know you should try it for a little while there when my wife was she worked a different job and she was getting up early.

So that was kind of nice. It's fucking, it's fucking horrible, isn't it? Well, no, it's great. You get in. No, it's horrible. I liked it. I don't know. I'm a morning guy, I guess.

Are you? Yeah, to some extent. I mean, I guess I've seen you out of the sleeping bag nice and early. Like, come on, let's go. Yeah. Checking out the sun. That's fair. You are a morning guy.

It's good stuff. You don't even drink coffee. got the sweet lady ddp yeah you're a weirdo you're a weirdo morning guy now yeah for sure um i just get get high off nature man just see that that's it that's it that's it there you go um yeah yeah so we've got a couple of returnees today. Mr. Phil Wolf and Mr. Billy Hunt. Hello. A couple of Floridians. What's going on? What is up?

East Coast, West Coast, bro. Yeah, right? Nice. Here we go. Nice. But the East Coasters are going to be fighting amongst themselves. So we'll just try to keep it, you know, keep it civil,

keep it civil. So what's going on in the world of herpetoculture? Guys got anything cool going on? I got a pretty, I got a pretty cool one this morning. Oh yeah. You got a new snake, did you? Yeah.

Yeah. So excited about that one. A little bit of a behemoth there. Big old coastal girl. Easily my biggest snake now. Wow. Easily? Yeah, I might need to see. Easily, yeah.

Were you ready for that? Were you ready for the... I was, yeah. I cracked the bag open, and I just saw the head, and I was like,... I was. Yeah, I cracked the bag open and I just saw the head. And I was like, oh, man. Yeah. He's feeding this thing cats or something. Yeah.

Actually, I haven't been feeding her much at all. So hopefully she'll eat. It was on the Owen McIntyre dietary intake program. Exactly. Yeah, I guess you kind of forget sometimes how big they've gotten. Because I went to pull her out. I'm like, oh, no, I hope I have a box big enough for this girl. guess you kind of forget sometimes how how big they've gotten because i went to pull her out i'm like oh no i hope i have a box big enough for this girl she filled it up it's very common it's very

common for billy to call me on my way to work in the morning because he's getting off shift but when i pick up the phone i go good morning billy what's up and he goes it's gigantic i knew it had to be something unique he's like it's the biggest carpet in the collection it's gigantic yeah i and i i don't tend to get my stuff that big you know like i i kind of keep it a little smaller but at least these days maybe that's from a bygone era when i used to feed them up heavy but oh she looks good it's just she has that big, beefy Morelia head that I thought I had in my collection. Then I saw this one. I was like, oh, man, I need to start feeding mine a little more.

How old is she? She's getting a little... I'm trying to think when I got her. I don't remember that well, but it's probably on her tag, I think. I think that one... Did that one come from Nick? I can't remember which one I sent to you. I've got two. Just kept the one in the better cage.

I feel like at one point in time, didn't all the caramels come from Nick? Yeah, I mean, through Paul, right? Yeah. 2014, the year of the caramel. Either directly or indirectly. I was kind of late to the game, so it was probably 2015, 2016 or something.

I think I picked... No, I got an albino from him when I went up to visit. I can't remember when I picked up a caramel. I don't know. It's all a blur. Too many good things. Read the tag. Yeah, exactly.

I have to write it down. Got it. I can't remember what I did yesterday, you know. Well, yeah, I think my inlands are starting to feed really well, so that's exciting. Pretty much all of them have been pretty hassle-free, just threw in a mouse and they took it. So that's been helpful. I think I have three or four standouts that have not taken voluntarily yet, so they got a little assist feed. But, yep, still working on getting the blackheads a feed.

That's always a fun little challenge, so we'll see how that goes. Oh, yeah. Yeah. I'll have to pick jason hood's brain or something you're you're in with him right oh yeah what i need to do it's the one that's yeah yeah he knows his stuff he's the blackhead guy that's for sure yeah i guess we'll be hanging out with jordan in the in the spring so pick his brain a little more. Yeah, for sure. Nice. So, cool.

Geckos are doing good. They're growing, the little wheeler eye. So that's been fun. Need to send one over to Phil. Make him the wolf of wheeler eye. Yeah, you got to send me pictures. I got to see those little guys. Yeah, right? They're cool.

They're cool. I got one Stinktus egg from this entire season. One. And I've been cooking it slow. I got one St. To say that from this entire season. And, uh, it's right. I've been cooking it slow. It's only at like 80 degrees.

Cause the incubators all messed up, but it's at 52 days. And I'm like, come on, just keep going. Just, just, just keep going.

Yup. I know the feeling. Yeah. I had, uh, I think six or eight eggs and, I have four babies. So i had a couple eggs just kind of go south and i don't know why it's like one hatches and one doesn't so go figure i guess

are they are they kind of sensitive the eggs i don't know it doesn't seem like they're too bad so i i don't know i was talking with my australian buddy and uh steveford, you guys hear the Aussie Wildlife Show? He's one of the hosts on that. He's a really cool guy. He's got an amazing collection. I think he has all the Aussie pythons, like all of them. Like all of them. He lives in Australia.

But, yeah, he's got O.N. Pellies and he's got all of them. So we were talking incubation, trying to figure out how to improve the blackhead incubation. And he incubates all his eggs on 30 percent water to perlite by weight. So I've always done kind of one-to-one or 0.9-to-one kind of thing for water to perlite. But he does 0.3-to-one. So I thought that was interesting. I feel like perlite dries out so much faster. Well, I guess I should say it's vermiculite.

I use vermiculite perlite mixture. I use vermiculite. He does vermiculite. I'm pretty sure it's just vermiculite. But yeah, 30% water. I like the fine vermiculite. I like the coarse stuff. Really?

Yeah, I seem to, I don't know. we had a fight about that someday it's course we can you can you can wring out fine vermiculite i feel better than the stuff yeah like it's a little more tactile if that makes any sense i was like 30 and i'm like i live in a really dry place and he's like i live in the driest place in the driest continent on earth don't tell me dry mr dry yeah so he put me in my place pretty quick he's a funny guy touche i'm excited to go hurt with that guy but yeah so good times but yeah i don't know i i uh i'll see see if if making some changes can help improve the success rate. But, yeah. Oh, my gosh. I didn't even say the word.

Yeah, I didn't say anything. I did not say peak haul. It didn't work. It didn't work. It didn't work. That's so funny. All I have to do is, usually all i have to do is say his name and yeah she goes bananas that that peak call episode was crazy man i imagine that was even crazier

being in the room there yeah i can't i can't imagine what justin had to go through with that one especially like after the show oh geez did he crash at your house he said he was he was threatening at the end of the show that he was going to come over. No, I was expecting to get that phone call from somebody, and I didn't. And there was a sigh of relief, but at the same time, I was kind of disappointed. All that threatening and no show. Well, it sounded like you guys had fun in Daytona. That looked like a good show it would have been always yeah that's is that kind of the local show for you guys or do you

travel a bit to get there it's fairly local for me yeah it's about four hours for me okay not too bad a little bit two and a half okay. That's about what my local shows are. It's far enough that we make a weekend of it. Uh-huh. Yeah. That's cool. Pretty well attended? Lots of people selling stuff? It was slower sales-wise.

That was for everybody. I mean, we got all the legislation and stuff, too. I think that kind of played a part in it. Yeah. Because I noticed in past years, you'll see people walking around walking around with like 20 deli cups looking for the next deal. And I didn't see that at all this year. People are a lot more frugal and stuff. But there were a lot of people there.

Was Fish and Wildlife there walking around? Did you see them? They're always there. Yeah. Yeah. I know Jason got inspected. I know Jason got inspected. I didn't get inspected, but, you know, they just randomly go and, you know, hey, do you got all your stuff? Is everything on the up and up?

All that kind of stuff. Yeah. So you had to get a permit to bring stuff in from out of state, huh? Is that how it worked? Yes. Man, that would be nuts. It's a free permit, but I almost didn't get mine because I did what they said on the site to do. They're like, oh, when you do your class three, you can just do a handwritten note requesting it, and you can get the year. It's a year long with that at no cost.

Well, I did that in March, july comes around and i'm like hey where's my import number you know and i probably had to call back and forth four or five times bureaucracy there is they're making things difficult but i was able to get it so what is the i mean so i guess i'm kind of like, so it's free. You just have to have a permit to import stuff. What is the, so it's good. It's data collection is all it is. They're trying to figure out how much of all the different species are here.

So like when I go to Tinley in a couple of weeks, whatever I don't sell and was already in the state, but I took out of the state and brought back in, I have 72 hours to submit that to the state. And then they'll put that, you know, those numbers with all the other numbers. So we even have to go that far. So anything, no matter what that comes into the state. So they're just trying to get a inflow outflow, total, total populations and total species diversity list and then not that they would be saving anybody's personal information to get a list of who's yeah no no why would they do well

i mean they already they already have all that yeah yeah man they're just at the very basic you know bare bones to it it's just data collection for them to do god knows what in the future could it whatever they want could it be could it what they're doing could it be for for good or is it just malintent i mean could they be saying hey this is a big business all these people are doing all this business with reptiles we we don't want to mess with this too much or are they just like using it to try to take away space? When I say we, it's like the state, the hobby here in the state. That was the first thing we hit them with was the economic impact that the state has on by the hobby.

And they pretty much saw it and just kept doing all the, you know, the laws and all that. There's a few lawsuits and stuff, and I'm sure that doesn't make them happy because we've won a couple of them. And, you know, it's where you got to hit them in the pocket. It's kind of seeing how it goes, you know? Yeah. I'm nervous because they have carpet pythons in the crosshairs, you know? So we'll see how that goes.

But I'm a lot more optimistic than Phil. You know, Phil's like, you can just see by his expressions. Yeah, like, you know, fool me once, shame on me. Fool me twice. You ain't going to fool me again. Fool me three times, five times, ten times. Now I'm just letting myself be fooled, you know. Yeah.

So what do you think if they outlawed carpets does that mean you're finding a new state to live in or you just give up your carpets I wish I wish I had that option but I'm pretty rooted here in real life you know the reptile life in real life

so I have an idea of what I'll do you know but you know it's also not worth you know if they outlaw it and it's you know it could make me a felon it's not worth that you know life-wise but yeah there's no sense in losing sleep until you have something to lose sleep over you know yeah absolutely yeah well like i'm still bringing stuff in yeah yeah there's still that yeah and it's such a bummer because you just don't know like where the regulatory head of them is at like i mean they're you know they're doing all this stuff and like what's their what's their

end intent like is it you know to see how far it goes or is it just to kind of have the power as neat to to do as need be um you know the the head guy has already been on record saying that they want to and i'm paraphrasing a little bit this is the gist of what he said was that they want to ban anything that can live in the wild in the state of florida and that basically means anything that can live in the wild in the state of Florida. And that basically means anything that can live in the Keys, you know? So basically everything can live in the Keys. Yeah. That's like a, that's a ridiculous, I mean, there's so much shit that already lives in the Keys and that you can't get that back. So it's like,

I know the Keys pretty much like ruined anyway. Like is anything native there? I mean, like I get it. I get what they're saying like we don't want more but like you're not i mean what are they doing to put the genie back in the bottle nothing so you know well i've always looked at it as it's an easy win for them you know because the general population isn't really big on what we do yeah yeah you know as a hobby we're such a minority anyway that no matter what, it'll probably be difficult for us to get the voice that can overtake

the PETAs and the humane societies and those people that are in their ears right now with all the money behind them. So that's why, like Phil said, you can only wait and see what's going to happen and hope for the best. And unfortunately, when you're fighting agencies, that regulatory muscle, if they want to push it, you're not going to win against it. One of the lawsuits is going against their state constitutional right to actually pass these laws since they're appointed officials, not elected officials.

That's kind of causing some hoopla right now. Of course, they don't like that. You can't blame them. They're still, at the end of the day, doing their job. They're doing what they think is right. Yeah. No, and I think that's the kind of unfortunate part of it is nobody's really wrong here, right?

They see it from their side, and they are doing what they're doing. And, you know, we see it from our side and we feel like they're overreaching. So I know, Phil, you're looking at me like I'm crazy. Yeah, and there's definitely money involved. it is a complex, nuanced topic, but, you know, I don't, I don't, uh, I don't think that the people on the other side of this, you know, have malice hearts and are just like, you know, uh, we're going to get those dirty bastards, you know, we'll show them. I think they really feel like they're trying to do something, uh, that's going to help's going to help wildlife in the state, which I don't know how they get there from that.

I believe the direct quote from one of the state representatives was, ban them all. They're destroying my dock. I'm sick of paying for it. And she was referencing green iguanas laying nests in the canal banks of her multi-million dollar home. Yeah. and green iguanas laying nests in the canal banks of her you know multi-million dollar home so yeah i mean well that's one perspective uh a couple that list that came out a couple months ago and it had carpets on it and ball pythons and rainbow boas and a lot of commonly

kept stuff it just got released they sent that to one of the U.S. Arc Florida people. And, of course, I got nervous. I'm like, oh, crap, that's a lot of stuff that I keep. That's not good. And those are all the species that they've either assessed for how, you know, if they're high risk, mid risk, low risk for being invasive or whatever. But come to find out out that list has been around for about a decade you know that's nothing new those have always been there it just wasn't put

out to the public so there's that too this is this isn't like an overnight thing this has been something that's been on the board for a while and they still they haven't done anything yet so who knows if anything's going to come up yeah it. Just a scare tactic or is it, you know, something they're actually working on that they would make happen if they could. Yeah. Well, I think,

I think opera opportunity is, is the, uh, you know, is, is something that, that every politician and every regulator looks for when they're trying to do something.

And if they see an in with an opportunity, you know, well hanging for all of a sudden stuff that was dead, dead, you know, regulator looks for when they're trying to do something. And if they see an in with an opportunity, you know, all of a sudden stuff that was dead, dead, you know, dead on the road wakes up and starts walking around again. So, you know. Yep. Well, that list had boa constrictors on it and they were assessed years ago and they were determined to be high risk probability for being invasive here in florida they're not banned you know and they've known this for 10 to 15 years so it makes you wonder is there some type of you know do they look at the market of them or whatever are they just trying to get the low-hanging fruit like the yellow anacondas that a lot of people don't have it's hard to say because we don't know their whole hand let's just know what they're letting you know as soon as you ban the green iguanas they're going to

disappear from the rich people's docks you know that's how it works so yeah it'll fix the problem immediately and they're and they're not doing that they're breeding and now there's more of them because collectors aren't able to go and scoop the babies up and send them out of the state like they used to exactly yep you try to fix a problem and you make it worse all right well you guys learn the hard way you guys ready to fight oh yeah now i'm primed yeah yeah i just got got his blood pressure up yeah yeah all right so today we're gonna be uh well, you guys are going to be discussing is lineage good? I mean, is it important or is it just something snake nerds care about and they want to have their lineaged animals to show off to their other snake buddies?

Or if it actually means something or is helpful. So did I get the gist of it? Yeah. So, yeah, Phil contacted us while we were out herping Arizona. So, yeah, we're excited to get you guys on. Which, by the way, I wanted to say, that episode you guys did from the field in the car was one of my favorite podcasts of all time.

Oh, cool. Because you get great conversation yeah you guys get got great conversation from different aspects different thoughts and opinions and then at the same time it's like oh toad hold on we'll be right back pause toad pause toad like it was awesome it was just awesome just wanted to say that it was it was really interesting because i told justin like i think we should scrap the episode because it it was like, so like scatterbrained, like I felt like it was just so unfocused. And like, I, I was like, I'm not even sure how that came out. I don't, I don't really know. Like we stopped so much and we had to do it twice. Cause Justin recorded it through the speakers of the car at first. And it was like, it is so, yeah. And I, I, I did, I did kind of listen to some of it and I kind of see what you mean. Like it, it's, it was like it is so yeah and i i i did i did kind of listen to some of it and i kind of see what you mean like it yeah it's it was definitely cool like listening back because i'm like oh i remember i you know it's like it's like i was back in the car again yeah so

that was cool yeah nipper said a message saying hearing the wheels you know it's like makes me itch to get back out there yeah for, for sure. I just think, like, I've tried to do the, like, live herping, live road cruising. And, like, Casey Cannon and I did one, and we didn't find anything. And then at one point, like, a meteor crashed, and it was, like, crazy lighting up the sky. And both of us were like, oh, my God, aliens. And everyone's listening to this live going, like, what the hell is wrong with these guys? We're on a freaking snake. So I've had such bad luck with it.

It was great to hear you guys have an awesome one. And that night was kind of slow too. We only found the couple toads and the Western diamondback and a little gecko. But yeah, it was fun. I mean, those guys, yeah, that was a fun crew. So I had a good time out there. All right. Well, let's go ahead and flip the coin. Who wants to call it?

I'll let Phil do it. This was his baby. Alright. Go ahead, Phil. Alright. I'll say heads. It is heads. You have won the coin test, so you get to pick your side. I'm going to pick the side that

lineage is a waste of time okay all right well um and as the coin would feel nick mutton knocking on my door the coin toss winner do you want to go first or do you want to defer to billy oh oh no i'll defer to okay all right oh you sure i'm all on Phil. That was the side I would have picked and exactly the way I would have handled that. Hey, on the screen, I'm above Billy, and I kind of side with, you know, it could be a really good thing. Okay, all right. It's good.

We'll see. We'll see. All right. All right. So let's get into it. Lineage doesn't matter. Obviously, I'm going to refer a lot to carpets here since that's what I deal with mostly. That's what we like.

Does lineage matter? I think it is. It is. I think it does matter, especially for a species like carpets that haven't, for the most part, legally been exported since the, you know, late 70s, early 80s, stuff like that. So if, you know, I guess it just depends on what kind of keeper you are. If you, you know, really want that wild type animal, you know, the ones that came in, if you can track them and trace them back, you know, 20, 30 years, you know, how cool is that? Like, you think about people that have purebred dogs and all, it's the same concept, you know, it's not any different in snakes. So is it absolutely, you know, necessary?

Not for everything, but for the right person, it absolutely is something that people want. Think about a lot of customers that you get. What's the first thing they ask, especially carpets? Hey, what's the lineage on this? What's that? And once you get into carpets and you start to learn everything and you get everything straight, they're a little hard to understand at first. But you'll start to hear buzzwords that'll make sense and you'll know where they're coming from. If I say, hey, this is a Lasik lion jungle,

you know exactly what I'm talking about. You know the look that they're going to have. You know, if you have those animals, you can reproduce that look. You know exactly what you're getting. There's no guesswork. There's no, you know, anything that's going to come out of the woodwork that you're not expecting. So from a breeder standpoint, that would be important because now you know what you're going to produce, you know what you're going to have, and, you know, you can be consistent year after year with what you put out. And, you know, people are going to know what you're asking for, and they're also going to be willing to pay more as well because you have that lineage behind you you know if you end up having a lineage chart where you can go back with the parents grandparents great-grandparents and it goes back 20 years yeah you know that animal is going to be you know one of the trophy animals

in your collection whether if it's trophy by looks or if it's just trophy by lineage, because you can say, Hey, here's what this animal is. And here's why I can say that. So it's my opening statement on that. And just to add to that, you know, if you've got that lineage with all the ancestors of your animal, you can also see at a glance what everybody looks like and get a good, good view of kind of what's what what you can expect from your your new uh baby i guess all right phil floor is yours well i see you phil let's hear it i i thank you for that insight i agree with you on a lot of those topics um i'll start off by saying that you can't agree with me that That's not the point of this. Oh, no, no, no. But I can, though. So I will say this flat out. I think that lineage is cool. I

enjoy lineage. In fact, there's actual animals in my collection that I purchased specifically because they came from particular breeders in particular lines. That being said, our community is very small, but our hobby is very big. And if you go into any exotic reptile store in the country, as a normal Joe Schmo off the street says, you know what, I think I'm going to get my first reptile. I think I'm going to get my kid a bearded dragon or what have you. 95% of those animals in those stores, the staff, the owners, the clerks have no idea where that animal came from, who it was bred by, who the parents were, what they looked like, when they were imported, when they were bred, how many generations, F10, F50, whatever it may be. They have no idea. But it doesn't deter from the fact that the animal is awesome and that it's going to be enjoyed by a loving family and whoever's going to be keeping it.

So when I go into one of my local pet shops, that's a mom and pop joint. And I say, man, look at these baby coastals. You know, it's the season, right? Look at these baby coastals. Who produced these? I have no idea. Well, where'd you get them from? This guy who does a lot of wholesaling.

His name's Bob. OK, well, can we find out find out no because bob has no idea bob buys from seven different breeders and he has no idea where this baby came from now to me because i'm part of that five percent it might make a difference but to the other 95 of the people shopping for a baby snake it's irrelevant to them and that's why most of these pet shops don't keep track of that i'm not saying necessarily that the lineage is bad overall i think it's great i come from a horse family where racehorses lineage is everything but to the normal person going to buy their first snake or going to buy a pet snake or a pet lizard what have you it's honestly irrelevant

to them. And that's the majority of the people in our hobby, not necessarily the community, not necessarily the diehard weirdos like us, but to the average person, it's irrelevant. Fair point. Yeah. What you got for that, Billy? All right. you got for that billy all right so i think we can all agree with the someone first gets in the carpets they don't know much about you know as much as we nerd out about it and all the different

lines and all that so they just see a cool carpet they pick it up they don't know anything about it they raise it up for three four or five years and then they start thinking about breeding and they start looking into that more and then what do they run into well hey if you have an ij you should breed it to another ij and keep that going uh jungle whatever then they find out that they can't figure out what their animal is for sure because they never asked those questions or they got it from the mom and pop shop that isn't you know doesn't know or got it from eight different people you know whatever happens and what ends up happening i've seen it time and

time again now they want to get into breeding and they're not going to use that animal because it doesn't have the lineage behind it so if you're looking for you know just a pet of course it doesn't it doesn't matter if that's what you're looking for but if your end goal is to breed now it ends up being a thing that's important to you and something that you want to want to go into um another point i wanted to bring up and i'm sure you remember Justin this, uh, remember when diamond jungles were a huge thing, they were everywhere. Yeah. 50%,

75%, 88%. Yep. All that. Selling for more than diamonds were in some cases, some of the crosses. Yeah. You know,

before we figured out how to keep diamonds and all that. Um, and we kept really good track of, you know, what they were. They were, you know, 75% San Diego line diamond to a Python Pete line jungle. And you could track all that and everything, you know, you knew what you had. And then diamonds ended up making a surge, figured those out. Now those animals are, I mean, I like to think they didn't all pass away. I'm sure they're still floating out there somewhere, you know.

But now we have, you know, question marks into where, you know, what is it and what are all these animals that we see now? You know, because I like to think that they had to go somewhere. Something had to happen with them, you know. So if we still had the lineage behind everything, we could know, you know, where those animals went, what they're doing now, what their babies are doing now, all that. So when you have the lineage, you have the ability to track that, and you know exactly what you're putting into your projects you know like i like doing morph projects where let's say i have a a caramel that's a coastal animal uh granite that's a ij animal and a zebra that's a jungle animal i like to know how much percentage of each subspecies is within that animal it's where i can completely track the what it is you know so that's

my my outlook on that you know the more it's basically the more knowledge you have on your animals the more you can kind of guess on what is going to express out of the babies and you know then you can be more upfront and honest about what your animal is. It's all about representing exactly what they are. Uh, and having that lineage is basically the only way you can do. Which we know, you know, reptile people are really good at, and they never try to misrepresent an animal. Exactly. Yeah, exactly. Well, but I mean, do you guys feel like, um, you know, so I had, uh, I, back in the day and I bought them. I don't know if I bought them through Fauna, Kingsnake, but they were hairline jungles. It was a highlighter, Soul Glow, I believe was the clutch that they came from.

I got some babies from you. They were cool. Yeah. So they were amazing. I mean, fantastic animals. But I bought them secondhand from a guy who supposedly bought them from Andrew. And this is what he sold them as. I had no way to, like, I mean, you know, I bought them as babies.

And I had no way to verify, you know, like, it's not like I bought them from Andrew, right? But I bought them from this guy. And they looked like nice jungles, right? They grew up. They looked like highlighter jungles. Were they? I don't know. I can't verify that.

But you know what? I didn't have any problems selling them because they looked like highlighter jungles. And oh, by the way, the lineage on highlighter jungles, suspect, but nobody cared. Undocumented animals. Yeah, exactly. jungles suspect but nobody cared yeah exactly and so but and i guess i guess the point i'm making is like i feel like there's this like threshold where when the animal is hot enough people are like yeah i don't give a shit i like it i want it you know what i mean working on it yes yeah right i mean that's a great point and and it kind of goes with what I was just Billy kind of unknowingly augmented what I was just talking about, because he kept saying, when we when I when they were the meeting people that want to breed people that want to really get nose deep in this right but that's not the majority of people that's our core

little you know collective community right and there are so many people that go to a reptile show they go I want to get a jungle carpet right and they see one from whether it be you know Australian addiction or will buy me or whatever right and they buy it and they're like this is really cool and they may ask the lineage but did they retain it did they write it down do they really even know or do they just want to ask the right questions on the scene they take it home they raise it up they go man this is so cool i want to breed this but i really have no idea what it is it's not going to stop them from doing it yeah

billy is has a good point of like oh maybe they buy other animals and they just keep that one as a pet but the majority of people that are buying this stuff, it doesn't pertain to them because they're either not going to breed it. And if they do, then they're just going to do whatever they want to do or what they think they might want to do. And I really feel like lineage is great for particular individuals to keep going with their projects, but it's honestly not relative to the grand scheme of things of people keeping these animals for the majority of people not us not not the freak weirdos like us that are obsessed with it you know what i mean and it just goes back to that classic pet shop scenario of i can't tell you how many times working in pet shops people say oh i

want to get a carbopython they buy a carbopython and then like three four years later like hey you know i think i might breed it what should i do well is it a jungle yeah it's a jungle well then breed it to another jungle all right cool i'll find a pretty one like the concept of lineage is irrelevant to them and it and same thing goes for the guys and gals that work in the shops you know they don't look at it as lineage because the people that are there that are buying those animals from them are not asking these questions it's irrelevant so as much as i think lineage is cool in the grand scheme of our hobby it doesn't really matter to the normal stuff the normal animals the normal lines the normal species you know i mean now you get something like rough scale pythons there's only so many of them

everyone's going to ask it's super niche everyone's going to ask okay who did this come from who did this come from how old is it here you know how long did they have it you know oh was that bred after they moved or before they moved because i know in 2016 they moved and that may have changed things in their dna or something i don't know that's super duper niche but at the same time it doesn't matter because they all came from the same animals that were imported yeah but i think and for the record phil we say nipper on this show it's it's super nippers yeah i apologize no it's it's fine it's fine i just just wanted to you know i won't have it i think nipper always gets his niche. To Billy's point, though, if they go and they get it really excited like I did and probably all of us did, when they said, okay, I started out with some random – actually, I started out with Python Pete lineage jungles that were purchased directly from Pete. But I did a lot of research when I was going to buy the first carpet, and I discovered there were more than just jungles.

There were all these other types. And if nobody's keeping track and a flashy morph comes along, all of a sudden all you have are just carpets, right? Just random kind of bred into each other carpets. So I don't know. I see, you know, that's kind of, at least for me, one of the important parts of lineage is you can kind of keep all the different subspecies and all the different things straight. And if you're going by locality,

even better in my mind, because then that gives them the opportunity to work with that down the line when they discover there's an inland or there's a, you know, and it's not just a big mishmash of inland jungle diamond or whatever. Sorry. Yeah. I didn't mean to hijack there, but I just couldn't, couldn't hold that one back. You want to elaborate on that? Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. So low cows was something I wanted to hit on.

It's one of those things. Once you breed them to something that's not that same low know because it's it's one of those things once you breed them to something that's not that same locale it's gone you know and if everybody has the mentality of hey it's you know carpets a carpet i really don't care like you know just like you said down the line it the potential for that casual person that just got the got a carpet the potential for them to want to breed and you know get deeper into it down the line is fairly high you know i think you know once if they end up keeping it for four or five years i mean the next progression is wanting to breed and then you start looking at um you look at different breeders and what they're producing and what they're offering and what

people are interested in getting, you will find that once you get out of the mom and pop shop, pet shop realm, which there's nothing wrong with that, but once you outgrow that and you start going to shows, you start going to breeders' websites and stuff, then it does matter. So even though it might not matter at the beginning, there'll come a point where it does for someone who takes it seriously. Now there are going to be people that, hey, I just want a couple carpets and I just want a pretty snake. Absolutely, that's always going to be there. There should always be that opportunity to get those rockhamptons, those gelatins, those inlands, the brettles, stuff like that. And if we just mismatch everything and just don't keep track of anything, then that's where we'll end up losing species or subspecies to the hobby. How many have we lost to the hobby as it is, you know,

and all the different species that we have or used to have? Look at Alterna. That's a good example, you know, with all the different localities and how everybody wants to keep those pure and all that. Have you ever seen someone try to, you know, move one that they didn't know what it was, you know, whether if it's Christmas Mountain or whatever, you know, move one that they didn't know what it was, you know, whether if it's Christmas mountain or whatever, you know, good luck. So it just depends on what realm you're in. Another point that I wanted to bring up, let's say you're breeding a specific line or whatever, and a defect comes up, you know, if you keep that line pure pure you can kind of keep track more of where that defect come from and then you know end up working to either rectify the situation or realize that it's

you know a mute point uh granites come to mind you know with that when they first came over they were already incredibly uh inbred and it took a little bit, but once we figured out, oh, we just have to outcross them and then, you know, kept them pure and all that. Of course, we could have just bred them to jungles and coastals and, you know, would have did the same thing, but we were able to save that mutation and strengthen it and keep it pure to where now, if you go to the right breeders, they have, you know know pure ij granites and they don't have any of the fertility issues or uh you know some of them were doing the neuro thing and all that you know but by people caring and keeping that pure now we can still offer that to people once

they get to that step in the game you know instead of it just being a carpet's a carpet pure defect morph yeah but see i don't i i i see what you're saying the whole you know not keeping a carpet a carpet right but i really do feel like we're still talking about an in-depth nipper. Thank you, sir. Yeah, an in-depth nipper that, let's say someone decides they want to get a carpet python because they saw me playing with mine and they're like, oh, Phil's got one that's really cool. I'm going to get one. Let me do some homework. Let me do some Googling, which is what nobody ever does, to be really honest. They either go down a really deep rabbit hole Or they just go by the first one they find

And yes that was very stereotypical and cliche Of me to say that but eh whatever So They decide wow look at those gelatins Those gelatins are awesome But man they are a lot of money And I don't know if you're aware of this But the Port Moresby Purples

They look exactly the same And they're like $500 less. So I'm just going to buy one of those, and then later on, I'll get a gelatin one. I got a little extra money, and I'll just put them together. It's close enough. They're carpets. They look very similar. They're both brown, whatever.

And then later on, sells them as gelatins. Well, then it's all irrelevant. of him you know i i bought really really nice neon orange davis mountain subox that were supposed to be a hundred percent het for exanthic until rob stone told me that the davis mountain localities are devoid of the exanthic gene and that they're either not exanthic at all or not het at all or the person boldly lied to me and they're mudded out so i wound up getting rid of those animals regardless but it just goes to show you that lineage is cool but it doesn't change how people are going to act it doesn't change what people are going to do and just because it's supposed to be one thing doesn't necessarily mean that it always is

we know we have to go to the people and trust that the breeders and the producers, for lack of a better synonym, are trustworthy individuals. And there's a lot of them are. All of you guys are. I trust all you guys, right? But when it comes down to brass tacks, it's still a jungle, and it's still a carpet,

and it's still attractive, and that's not going to stop anyone from a loving that animal or b breeding it to just another attractive carpet and everyone talks about lines right i mean i've i've got tons of line stuff right specifically because i enjoyed the breeder and i enjoyed that line but who's to say that you can't make your own line who's to say that you know you guys have had this discussion about line stuff on your show and on NPR and stuff. What determines a line, right? Who's to say that you couldn't take two mutt jungles, right, and breed them consistently to themselves, to siblings, whatever, and produce some bomb ass animals and make your own line.

And everyone's going to poo poo it and say, oh, no, don't buy that. That's the fill line. They start off as trash. No, they're going to say, those snakes are freaking cool. I'm going to buy them. Well, hopefully. So I think that the lineage is great. But again, it's only relative in certain consistencies, in certain circles, in certain instances.

And it's not always the case it doesn't always need to be well you proved my point with your subox that once you found out that they weren't pure you got rid of them right away well so it is important it would hold on a second it was important to what i wanted to do but at the same time i have other subox that are just straight mutts and i'm okay with that and I know they're mutts I'm gonna breathe them and I'm gonna make more attractive mutts now I'm the kind of guy that won't say oh they came from Billy Hunt you know they're Billy Hunt line I'm not gonna do that but there's copious amounts of other people that not

only will do that they may not even know that that's a thing yeah and then someone's gonna ask them and be like hey man dude that sub hoc looks awesome who whose line is that i have no idea it's it's got two stripes on its back is that the line you mean and people are still gonna buy it because they like it you know what i mean and i i really feel like lineage is a great thing but it's not necessary in all cases at all and 95 of the time and again my statistics that's it excuse me are not definitive but they're not real i just made them in my head but the majority of people buying these animals have no concept of lineage and honestly don't care and hey i remember a carpet breeder uh back in in the MP days who had a pair of snakes that literally changed subspecies as time went on.

Like literally in front, like like literally he would post it. And then like a couple of years later, it was something else and something else. And you're like, am I on am I on drugs? Like what is you know so and and and i'm sure you guys have probably talked to people who have told you a story about reptiles and and as time goes on the story changes a little bit right and i think all of that is human nature right so so it's kind of tough sometimes i think to your point though, Billy, like you have to, you have to be able to anchor somewhere and there does, there does need to be some way to like, you know,

they need, somebody needs to keep track. Right. But, but we're always fighting uphill against human nature. Well, I had it work the opposite way with me we we bought ben and i bought a pair of diamond pythons and uh they were the cypress creek line and everybody told us oh those are yeah exactly and and and then uh i guess later i i think uh was it nick that that found out they were actually a pure line of diamonds somebody just didn't think they looked right and so they started telling everybody they were crosses and so they became crosses in everybody's mind and we got rid of them because they we were told they were most likely crosses which they probably weren't they i don't want i don't want to be that guy but i swear to

god back in the day nick was also the guy who was like, yeah, that guy has diamond jungle crosses and real jungles, so you can't trust his stuff. He was saying that about Python Pete, and I'm like, well, Pete was selling crosses for more, so why would he lie that his jungles were pure and sell them as pure if he could get more money by saying they were crosses? And that's another like it's tricky people people will salt your game and it's like yeah you know that guy might have done anything wrong but like you know and somebody train wrecked his shit yeah somebody might go to the lengths of faking a you know lineage chart with a bunch of you know just random pictures of of of animals that they had, you know, there's no, there's no evidence that that was, and you're going to run across those

people, but usually they, they get outed at some point, you know, you're going to figure out their, uh, they like, I bought a pair of Cape York car, uh, Cape York spotted pythons and, uh, I got granites out of them. I'm like, well, I guess they're not pure. So I got rid of those, kind of pulled the fill there and got rid of them because they were not pure. They had some mainland spotted in there. But I kept a pair of the granites. They're beautiful, but I didn't keep the normals

and trying to pawn them off as Cape Yorks. That kind of pissed me off, to be honest. But it happens a lot in the reptile game. Somebody thinks they can. And I think that's part of it. It's a marketing thing. If you can show lineage, people have more confidence that what you're selling is what you're saying it is and so other people go along and and kind of uh you know do the same thing they kind of

counterfeit that to to get sales but we're also talking majority because all of us keep morelia we're also talking about an animal like morelia that is in limited supply it is a legitimate commodity because there's only so many of them here we only have so much genes and data and animals to work with so naturally you'd want to preserve as much lineage as you could but that's just us with our morelia you look at all these other animals that are either field collected or even long-term captives that are so prevalent and so readily available that no one cares. And now, granted, someone may say, oh, my friend produced this. I want one of theirs. Or, oh, Billy produces a nice one.

I want one of his. But Billy may not know where they came from. Billy may have caught them from three different counties and mixed them together because they look really good. You see what I'm saying? So, yeah, locality is cool and people like that but again it's super nipper and it only applies in in certain scenarios it does i mean people that want a particular garter snake or they want a particular uh corn snake yeah corn snake lineage is fantastic because you've got all these different crazy morphs But at the same time most corn snake guys and gals are swapping them across each other and it all gets lost in translation

Anyway, so just because you got it from Phil Where did Phil get it from? Did you ask him that does he have that written down? Who the hell knows you still got an awesome snake that you know the genes that are in there, or you're assuming that you know. You can only hope, kind of like my sub-ox and Justin's carpets. So another point that I'm thinking of with this is I'm thinking of Ridley Eye. So there's different looks to ridley eye with different locales you have obviously your cameroon highland animals that everybody loves those are the super bright ones and you know all the colors are incredible they look like rainbows but then

you have your more i mean there's no ugly one but compared to the highland animals you have your malaysian ones that are a little more drab. And then even now you have the Sumatrans or some are calling them Grabowski, you know, it's kind of still up in the air. But if you keep those localities or looks pure, then when someone's researching, they're seeing what look they like more. They know, hey, if I go to this guy that's only keeping Malaysian animals and they're still able to bring in animals from Malaysia and they can keep the lime pure, but add new blood to it and all that, then they're going to go to that guy if they want the highland animals or whatever. So if you just mix and match them all together, then you take that ability to

get the specific look that you want completely out of it. So is it a nipper thing? Depends on who you're looking, you know, who you're asking. But, you know, when people see an animal that they want, they see a look that they want, they research into it enough, they'll find that it's from a certain line, it's from a certain locality. And if they can't find somebody that's taken the time or cared enough to keep it pure and keep it that locality or line, then they're not going to be happy with what they end up getting. So there has to be those people, like we said, you know, somebody has to put the time in to do this. A lot of my projects, I have, geez, like three or four different stripe coastal lines. I'm on the camp of different lines instead of a stripe as a tiger.

Because I'm seeing just in my own collection, the different lines throw different looks and I'm seeing different things. So I'm comfortable calling those all different lines. And at the end of the day, they're, you know, from different founder animals, different bloodlines, all that. You know, if someone's looking for a Balin tiger, got those. Someone's looking for, like I have the Russian Balin crosses. I'm very upfront that the ones that I have are 50% Russian blood, 50% Balin blood. You know, they're not pure, but I'm also being upfront with what they are. So when someone gets them,

they know exactly what they're getting. And then when they decide to move that project along, you know, three, four years down the road, you know, hopefully they're going to keep track of what they're doing. And then, you know, obviously you can't control what people do, but all you can do is what you can do. You can only control what you do. So, you know, it just, it depends on the person.

If it's someone that is a casual keeper, like Bill's talking about, the 98% or whatever, okay, so be it. But they're not the ones that are going to keep these lines going. Those lines have to keep going at some point. So, Billy, I got one for you. So I just hatched out some red coastals from Camas that was from Luke Snell's red line, the male that founded Luke Snell's Red Line. And I paired it with a coastal female that I've had for, I don't know, since the early MP days and that I got from a guy named Ben Team.

And I tried to get lineage from Ben and he's like, yeah, I don't know. I got it from this guy in Philly. He didn't know. So I from this guy in philly he didn't know so i'm like okay cool so basically the best i could do is say like it looks like a pure coastal to me it's sized like a pure coastal to me i think this is a pure coastal but you know i absolutely have to say like hey i don't know I know half of the lineage in these babies, but I don't know what the female, you know, I don't know the backstory on the female. And I feel like sometimes, you know, that's just how it is. You just have to do that. Like,

and you disclose it and you say, it's up to you, right? It's, it's your choice. Um, you know, do you feel like, do you feel like, uh, that, like that that might be a reason not to work with? Like, would you would you buy into that red line if you had a chance knowing like the females potentially from and up front you know it's when people are being shady that the problems come out if you're completely honest about what you know the animals are and people know that getting into it once it leaves your place you can only do so much you know if you worry about what everyone else is doing you're going to drive yourself crazy and you're not going to focus on your stuff i have some m-pen uh red stripe stuff and you know stripe stuff from panel and he sent me lineage charts and all that his red line comes from an animal he got that was a red coastal that was not documented at a show in 05 and i know that and i still got into the project

because i like the animal yeah you know but i also know that i will say this they do look freaking awesome and they throw they throw crazy looking babies like dude i i had i had a a one from that red stripe line and it was the nicest it's the nicest coastal i've ever seen in my life like amazing yeah amazing but yeah it it falls in that same category of the highlighter jungles back in the day yeah we knew that they were questionable and that there was undocumented animals but we know that getting into it and we know that's part of that line and you call it what it is you know you don't say hey it's i know it's a pure jungle but i have highlighter in the lineage that know that's part of that line and you call it what it is. You know, you don't say, hey, it's I know it's a pure jungle, but I have highlighter in the lineage. That's that's not a thing. I have striped jungles that I work with or jungles that I work with. There's you know, there is an undocumented animal that I started that whole thing with and i think i'm three generations in now two or three and i'm

still completely transparent about what it is i don't call them pure jungles i call them you know what they are it's all about representing your animals to the best of your ability and i and if you know you can't when you try to like if i tried to pass them off as pures, that's where the issues are going to come up. I hatched out babies last year, and I had some of the top tier jungle guys. As soon as they saw how striped they were, they were like, what's the lineage? That was just a question. What's the lineage?

And I was honest with them. I'm like, oh, okay, good, cool. I didn't have money to spend anyway because that's not what they're looking for. But as long as you're honest to your ability like you're saying with your uh reds you know that's that's the best you can do and people getting into it have to know that when they get into it i think too like top tier jungle guys aren't gonna like your carpet book just yeah on this on that same page though too you too, you might have the formula. It's like writing down the formula.

If you get some cool look and you say, I crossed this line and this line and I got this, that documents that. And then you can use that down the road or somebody else can use that down the road and go, Oh, I've got that mix. And, you know, I think a lot of people might want to try to keep that as a trade secret or something, you know, like that. But I think, you know, there's, there's value in those lineages as well, even if they're not purity lineages or whatever, you can, you can have that information. It's, it's still valuable. And I think that kind of goes back to what Billy was saying about, you can, you can have that information. It's, it's still valuable. And I think that kind of goes back to what Billy was saying about, you know, like lineage phenotypes almost, you know,

breeding lineage phenotypes together to get almost their own line, you know, where you can pretty much, and you know, I think that's like people think about it. Like, um, I mean, I, I, yeah, I think that's, I think that's probably the story there is with lineage charts and line-based phenotypes, you can really do some pretty cool stuff and people have a good – a trust behind that. I think that's a very true thing. Well, Billy, can I tell the story as to why this fight actually came about? trust a trust behind that i think that's a that that's a very true thing yeah well billy can i can i tell the story as to why this this fight actually came about oh please do phil please do do you want to go sure yeah so billy has these these striped jungles that are they're freaking

gorgeous right and i don't want to speak ill of my one of my best friends but he's a little self-conscious about the whole fact it's undocumented right well i have an f1 mia and i love the look his baby jungles from that undocumented parent and i i want to do it and billy was kind of like hey man you know you should really think about what you're going to do because you know you don't want to mess up those those those fresh fresh mia genes you know and part of me wants to do it just to do it you know i mean be like yeah this is what it is it's a mutt and fresh mia what do you what do you what do you think you want to buy it you want to not buy it you want to trade what do you And it made me like it made me sad that Billy's undocumented jungle doesn't hold muster in certain people's eyes when they're freaking amazing. And they're going to produce amazing stuff in the future.

However, you want to call it, right? So, yeah, Billy's showing a picture right now. Oh, nice. Look at that thing. Yeah, that's nice. That thing is killer, man. And that's where this whole – Very classic coastal stripe, though. Right where this whole very classic coastal stripe though

very classic looking coastal stripe i know i know but i mean but but the colors man yeah just wait for the book you know oh i am yeah so i mean and and that's been my thing. So I did – I had the first jungle I ever got. I got from Ken Foose at Las Vegas Exotics, Las Vegas Pets, whatever. Yeah, Exotic Pets. Exotic Pets. And I didn't know the lineage. But it was my first carpet and I was just super into it. And I grew this thing up.

This girl was – she was fucking badass looking when she grew up. And I bred her to a coastal, and what came out of that probably was the nicest ivory-looking mutts that would put any ivory jungle that has ever been produced to shame like they glowed in the dark ivory white and they were bad as fuck and and they're total mutts and you know people would see them and be like oh my god that's insane looking but you know it's it's a crap carpet according to everybody and so i guess my point that i'm making is people get so hung up on the name or they get so hung up on the the background or the you know i have to it's it's it's like uh it like adds to the unobtainium of the animal right and if it's a mutt and it's just a hodgepodge then it's not you know it's not a long succession of special to culminate in unless it's a documented month

that has that lineage you know then then they make that a big deal and and that's fair yeah but but you know when you go when you go diamond jungle to coastal i don't know man most people are like you know you they do that for the look of the animal right it's got to be a great like if it's not a crazy looking animal they're like like, yeah, get that trash out of my face. Scream Jaguars are a great example of that where everybody wanted that look and everybody was chasing that look. And so that lineage of Scream Jaguars, you know, that sold. And that was the marketing thing. And, you know, they had lineage and they had you know

the breeders shown and what was in i mean i think you could go jag cross you could do a lot of jag crosses and say that was the way those were the hot ones you know people were like yeah who cares if the rest of the clutch is unsellable mutts but i got this one animal that's freaking awesome some of those some of those uh multi-way or i think there's brettles in them or something that don hamper's selling yeah those are crazy cool looking animals crazy they're gorgeous you know and you know i mean what's wrong with having a little side project where you have a pair of those things and and just breed crazy looking animals and as long as you're representing them right you. You, you know, you're,

you're, you know, being forthright about where they came from and what they have in them. Then I agree. I, it shouldn't, it shouldn't be a thing. It's just like, it's like where those two worlds mash. Sometimes we just don't do that very well. You know what I mean? Like, it's just like, for some reason it either has to be like perfectly documented and perfectly pure or like

you know messy and undocumented and that's okay like i don't know i just like i don't know yeah it does seem it does seem oh go ahead phil sorry no no sir just saying oh just just the fact that if you know you if you you kind of feel like if i have the undocumented just generic carpets i i wholesale them to and they go into the pet trade. And then the people you're talking about, the 98%, will buy those and be happy with their carpet python, and that's great. But I do think there should be that option if you want the lineage or you want the pure or you want that. There should be an outlet for that, and lineage helps to document that and kind of verify or, or provide some evidence of that.

And this is the last thing I'll say, and I'll shut up. Cause I feel like I'm said too much, but I think it's how a breeder wants to plug into the market. You know, what do you, as a breeder, what do you want to do? What's your goal? Where do you want to sit in the, you know, in the, the many facets of being a reptile breeder? And lineage does that, right? It kind of sets you – it shows that you're a little more –

It can. I mean I'm too lazy for those. I don't do a good job. And like we're saying, just having lineage doesn't mean it has to be pure. It's just having the lineage is just doing the best of your ability to track what it was well look at all those look at all those mud-ass chondros that people are getting crazy money for and you know and they have lineage back to back to yeah python e and they're all the way back to all hybrids. All the way back to Bushmaster, which may or may not be in the locality that was brought in under.

Yeah. Well, I think it's also, too, is somebody – I have an affinity for black snakes. Somebody, a good friend of mine, gave me a very, very rare, very expensive locality of Mexican black kings. And that's a species that we're not going to get more of because all those sites are closed. There's no export. We only have what we have here. But people realize that they're cool and they start producing them again

after like a 10-year hiatus. And now my really expensive ones that I've been raising for three years, no one cares. I don't even remember what the locality is because every time I tell the locality to someone, you know, send something with lots of vowels in there, right? People are like, oh, that's cool. I didn't know they had locality is because every time i tell the locality to someone you know send something with lots of vowels in there right people are like oh that's cool i didn't know they had locality once yeah yeah it's like well then what's the point like i might as well just mud them out

they're black snakes you know i bet i might as well mud them out and diversify the gene pool until until that catches fire and everybody goes i want that locality and you're like oh yeah i have that locality and then you can say i do have that documented locality but that's my lineage only if that happens well and who knows i mean that's i'm sorry i'm you know kind of like chuck said still on the show a little here but it's cool but uh it's cool you know like we don't know when they're going to shut the doors on imports and if you're keeping locality specific, you know, retic, say, you know, back when they were just being imported willy-nilly, and then all of a sudden they shut the doors and you're the only ones with, you know, this Bali locality or Sumatra, whatever locality, and you can say, hey, I brought these in.

They were from this place, you know, that kind of thing. Whether it's, you know, maybe the, the importer was a little off or whatever. It doesn't matter to, to that extent. I mean, you've got the best documentation you can, but, but you have some locality, you know, where, whereas everything else is just mudded out and morphed out and nobody knows, nobody knows and nobody cares. But then down the road, somebody might care and say, hey, I saw this snake in the wild and I really want that, you know, something that looks like that.

I can't find it because everything's a morph. It's kind of tragic. It's very true. So to give an example of kind of the opposite side, instead of keeping things, you know, wild type and all that, there's a ball python breeder tom bernhardt who has spent like the last 15 20 years or so don't quote me on that on black pastel animals to the point where if you put one of his animals next to the next guy's black

pastel there's no tell like it's not even it's not fair how different they look because he's taking the time to refine that gene and make it his own to where now it's tom bernhardt line black pastel and then whatever other combos he puts in it to where now people recognize that and if they want that look that's where they have to go and he has you know the lineage behind it to give them that and they you know they're getting from a you know, the lineage behind it to give them that. And they, you know, they're getting from a, you know, a respected breeder and they're getting what they're asking for. You know, if he didn't do that, that wouldn't be an option. It would just be, you know, a morph is a morph is a morph type of thing, you know, and not knowing.

Just give me the gene. I don't care what it looks like. I just want the gene. Yeah. Yeah. There's another option on it. You could take something that you really like that everybody has and refine it, make your own quote-unquote line, if you will. And then that's something people look for and will be sought after.

That's another reason to do it. So it will, you know, if you want to be a breeder, you always want something that sets you apart from everyone else, you know, or else you're just another face in the crowd. So that's, that's another way you can do it. And then if you have the lineage to back with you, man. I'm with you. But we're still talking about a small, tiny group of this massive hobby. And when someone like the Bells produce 10,000 California king snakes in a year to supply every single pet co across the country, not a single person that buys those animals is ever going to ask who bred them. And if they do, the clerk at Petco, nothing against Petco, the clerk at the big box chain store is not going to know the answer. They're not, because they're not the one who bought it. Their manager's not the one who bought it.

The purchasing district manager of the county perhaps may have asked for California Kingsnakes. But again, they don't know where it came from. So it's futile. And we're still talking about this very small nipper of a group. Thank you. It may be futile for that you know that part of the market but to say that lineage doesn't matter at all because the majority doesn't you know care that's not right to say either preach because

there should always be that option if i want to get pure rockhampton coastals i should be able to get that i shouldn't have to get Rockhampton Cross with whatever, you know, as long as they're still available. The jungle. Sorry. Rockhamptons don't stripe. I agree with you, but at the same time, no one, how do I phrase this?

You're right. You shouldn't be obligated to buy something that is a mutt that's not lineage traced. But at the same time, there's so few of that, that unless you're in this like we are, it doesn't make a difference. It doesn't. I get what you're saying, but you're talking about a certain part of the hobby that isn't the whole hobby. Yeah, you're throwing the baby out like the bathwater. You're aging yourself there, Doc. Yeah, right? Babies? Bathwater? so you're aging yourself there doc babies bath water

no and like i said man i'm i'm guilty of it i have a ton of locality stuff i have a ton of line not line excuse me i'll say uh selective breeders that i've chosen before their animals and those animals lineages but at the same time I bought a lot of stuff because I just liked the way it looked. And there's been other times when I wanted to know the lineage and I couldn't. It was physically impossible. I have a Darwin carpet that is a female and everyone who sees her loves her. And I'm convinced that she's pure Darwin, but I have no idea where she came from who produced her what she's mixed with So like when the time comes that she's big enough to breed I have to be really selective as to what I put to her

because If I do produce something I have to I have to be the nice guy and say look I have no idea where mom came from but she's freaking awesome looking and just go with it You know I went up I bought her from underground and I said hey who produced this and no one knew no one knew and finally I talked to the owner and I was like hey man where did these carpets you bought last week come from oh it's some guy named Chris in Miami hmm he had a class three license so we bought him that's it no idea there's a lot of Chris's in Miami so yeah but it doesn't but it doesn't change the fact that that animal there's a lot of Christmas in Miami. So yeah.

But it doesn't, but it doesn't change the fact that that animal is stellar and I'm going to produce her and I'm going to have an awesome time with it. You know what I mean? And the people that I have, yeah, right. Exactly. Yeah. So I guess that here I am talking when I said I wasn't going to, but I kind of I kind of mash like what we were talking about earlier about regulation and and our ability to even keeps carpets, you know, and like, I mean, to the point of like, then does that then is is our most pressing issue, the purity of our carpets or is it just being able to keep carpets in general? Or does that mean that our limited ability to keep them makes the lineage that much more important? I could see it going both directions too. And, you know, maybe the whole, like, if we go towards an AZA type model, like does, does that, you know, the, if there's regulation that, that kind of comes out of like

AZA type, you know, I hope to God we don't. No, I agree. I don't think that's going to be the best way, but you know, who, I mean, who, who knows which way the, the way once they start putting regulations and requirements in place where that goes. So I don't know. Maybe talk on that a little. Well, I came to think of something real quick, if I may. And this is going just back to what we were just talking about. I want to touch base on the AZA thing, too, because I like that. And I don't want to call Chucky out but i have to for my

own morbid curiosity so scrubs that you've produced that took you years to do do you have the full lineage and all the parents i mean they came straight from bush master so they came straight from cam so i mean no the no, the answer is, you know, like, yes, but no. Yeah. The answer is yes. But the answer is unless I went there and got them myself. No. You know what I mean?

Like, I don't. So if anybody, if anybody so much as tries to minutely insult what you've done or how you've done it or what those animals are, I'm going to fly to their home and kick them in the shins because that means nothing on paper because of what they are and what you accomplished with them. And if, and that's your, that's lineage right there. Now, granted, you may be setting the lineage, right? But there is no lineage that does not, and that shouldn't detract from them at all. One iota in my opinion. And I mean, you can kind of look at my tracia and say yep those are fucking homo hera scrub pythons like

without a doubt and they were you know they trust me they were wild caught imports like i had to do all the work they were wild caught imports so like i think at that point you can say yes beyond pretty much a shadow of a doubt there's no doubt and there's no questionability in my mind so if you guys want to question it if you don't want to believe it go ahead i mean you play the you can never really ever know game that's what some of these people do yeah you know and now and and then the internet's like wildfire man all it takes is one spark yeah and i don't want to ever see that happen to someone like yourself and it should never happen but people take it and they focus so much on on the lineage and the backstory and

and the hype of where it came from and who made it and there could be gems like yourself that get i don't want to say overlooked because of that but that shouldn't be a thing it shouldn't be like that it shouldn't and i mean i think you know i think in it using me as the example it might be tough to make that to you know that would be a tough sell that would be an uphill sell yeah if you wanted to say that but it was just it was right there in front no no i got you i'm with you i'm with you but but i definitely i mean your point is like extremely well taken because it doesn't take very much and you know i think we've already given examples of how you know just a pinch of salt really can uh sour the meat real quick you know and i was dead serious i will fly out and i will kick them in the shins

i am totally gonna hold you to that i think there's i mean to kind of hit both sides there's room in the hobby for both you know sides of it because there is a market on both sides. And I mean, I was given advice early on that I took to a degree, but I didn't take completely, but it made sense to me. It was buy with your eyes, not what the piece of paper says. And I've taken that with some, where there's some animals that I really liked. I'm like, man,

this is awesome. I can do this with it. I can do that with it. I'm like, Hey, what's the background on this? I'm not sure, man. We just, we got it in the shop and not, I don't know. And I had a decision to make. It was, do I want to work with that animal and always say, Hey, there's a big question mark here. I don't know. Or do I pass on it and go to an animal that visually might be subpar compared to that animal that I passed on? And I'm only working with it because of the line or what the lineage says. And that's just something that every individual has to decide if that's what they want to do uh phil you've been here i've got pure stuff i have crosses i have hybrids i have all of it you know

because i can't hone in on one one aspect of the hobby yeah you know but there's you know i'm saying it again there's room for all of it in the hobby. The whole point of this whole thing is just be honest about what you have and what you know. And if you don't know, say you don't know. And let the person who's interested make the decision if they want to work with that animal or not. That's really what it comes down to. And then once the animal leaves, yeah, it might be frustrating if you produce an animal that you told them isn't a pure jungle and you know three four years later they're like oh i got pure jungles and they're using your you know your animal or whatever but you can't you know i can't control what you do chuck you're not going to control what

i do right you know that like you said human nature humans will be humans but usually guys that do that aren't gonna last as long as the guys that are going to be honest. Or they get it or they get a name. They get a reputation. It gets around. Oh, the oh, the whisper of this or which which is like both part of the good and part of the bad of the hobby. Right. You get people talking shit on each other because they're jealous or whatever and they shit on somebody. And then it gets around and it's like totally fucking not true. But I think what you said, all of it, it was spot on, beautifully said, perfect. I think that is all of it super, super, super on point.

Yeah. And to take my fight hat off for a second, I totally agree with Billy. Yeah. And to take my fight hat off for a second, I totally agree with Billy. By the way, I love his attention to detail with all of his animals in terms of feeding and breeding and the lineage of everything. And I've tried, I've really tried to model a lot of his templates and his mantras with his room. And a lot of it, I just can't. I just I don't have the mental space to do it you know I mean and I commend him for that and this fight is so hard because like what Billy just said there's avenues of both and it all started because I was annoyed that we were even concerned about pairing future snakes that don't even exist yet like it bothered me that i was doing that you know what i mean and it still goes to

it matters to us in our circle but in the grand scheme of things it does play a factor but it may not be necessary for the average Joe. Yeah, I think. I agree. I mean, and that's 100 percent. That's 100 percent true as well. I think, you know, in typical in typical Fight Club fashion, you know, both sides are 100 percent right here. So but but but well stated and nuanced and and difficult and you know i think people get so dogmatic uh both directions about stuff and people are so anti you know like i i cannot tell you how it fucking burns my cloaca when when people are like mutts are worthless and they're

horrible and they're like because some of them are freaking awesome. Yeah. Some of them are ugly, but there's some pure shit that is the ugliest shit on earth. And, but, but people hold it on a pedestal because it has, it has a lineage name or something about it's, it's a, it's tied to a name or it's a thing, you know? And, and it's like, I just, you know, I, I, I don't know. I, I, you Chuck, we need to remember beauty is in the cloaca of the beholder. Oh, that's a good one.

One man's ugly carpet could be another man's treasure. You never know. That is fair. That needs to be on an AAR shirt. Yeah. Yeah. That reminds me of a quick story um when i found out about mp i was i basically just lurked i wasn't there's no way i was getting on that you guys it was intense you guys are hell on wheels but one of the few times i did ask a question was uh they were talking about the i say the s word the sibs from

ij jack you were that i remember that yeah so talked about that and everybody was like oh just call the sibs you know they're worthless type of thing So this is around the time that albinos were making a, you know, appearance here. This was the Chris Proctor era. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. So that was just my next question. I was like, hey, what if I had an IJ jag and I bred an albino to it?

Am I still culling all the sibs? And they're like, oh, no, no, no, absolutely not. Why would you do that? So this animal's life is only worth its genetics. At that point, it wasn't for the animals that, hey, we could find a home for it for the 98% that Phil keeps talking about. It's, oh, it's not worth the time. Throw him to the blackhead.

Throw him to the kingsnake. Hey, if it's head albino, hang on a second. And then if you take to the next step. Oh, hold on. Hold on. Pee call. Pee call. Pee call.

Pee call. Pee call. Pee call. So if you take it to, like, oh, my gosh, I'm going to have to mute here. Yeah, they love Pete call. Yeah, that was a great point, man. Yeah, great point. Well, like you still tie it into what we're actually talking about.

You still have the lineage of what that animal is. You have 88% IJ jags you know that those normals that are non-jags are 88 ijs 12 coastal just be honest about what they are and you can find people that are gonna want them you know the that was just something that drove me crazy but oh if it had something that you know was quote-unquote valuable that makes the life more valuable whatever but you're do you do you remember the second iteration of that whole shit show when sibs became magic there was something magical about sibs there's i don't know what it is i can't tell but there's something magic going on that's where it started right that's that was that came first wasn't it i think i think it was the jack sibs they were just they were just sibs and then um they weren't

worth anything and then somebody basically was like no there's something going on here these things got something to them these things are mad there's some magic in these and that you know that once that once that wore off it was just like no they're just regular coastals that's all they are they're just regular coastals and everyone's like all right they're regular coasts yeah except for unless they had like ocelot or something right then they're oh yeah well i mean yeah i think i think valuing an animal based on its genetics is something that needs to to go away and i mean granted you know people want rare they want different so they want some mutation or whatever um i i don't know we were looking at uh people will always covet the

thing though dude we're looking at whether it's pure species or the morph or the you know the lineage they will always covet the thing so i don't know that it ever goes away and you know i think a lot of times it's you know kind of defies common sense because you get a morph and then people get excited about it just because it has a morph. But it doesn't look any better than the wild type. We were looking at Dustin's Azanthic Mexican liar snakes, were they? And the wild types are like bright red. Why would you, why would you take out all the red? You know, they were like an ateristic, uh, uh, Mexican, uh, liar snakes.

Why would you take out all the red of a red animal? It just, you know, it's kind of strange. I fell into the hype with sub box. I was like, oh man, the Xanthic ones or anery or whatever ones are black and gray they're awesome it's all so cool it's gray with black stripes and then i went up getting like davis orange ones i'm like these are natural and then we saw when we were in west texas that one that got squished by the semi truck and i'm like dude this is natural this is crazy like forget the morphs yeah but but I guess if you've produced 500 that look the wild type

and then you hatch out something different, you might be excited about that. That might be something different that you're not used to. And if that's what you're doing and you're producing great stuff and you hatch out something different, you're like, oh, this is neat. This is new. This is different. This is interesting.

And then maybe five years down the road, you don't feel the same way about that. Yeah. And I mean, taste can change and you can move projects on. And that's kind of, I guess that's, there is some fun to the whole morph game. I mean, I got sucked into it with the ball pythons and I got to admit, it was fun watching those babies hatch out and not knowing what you were going to get know and having a diversity of appearances in one clutch it's fun but you know it got old kind of fast and so i i don't have ball pythons anymore i put them all out on breeding loan you know so it's just one of those things but i don't know if somebody can have fun with them then that's great I I you know uh I I can't

say that I don't have any morphs you know so yeah it is what it is well any uh one last yeah yeah any uh concluding thoughts any uh big big points to kind of sway people your way or what do you think? Go ahead, Phil. I'll just say this lineage is lineage is an awesome thing if it's done right, but it also should not sway someone from enjoying the animals that they find awesome. That's a good point. Yeah. I like that.

What do you got, Billy? Just, uh, represent what you have honestly to the best of your ability and let people decide what they want to do. I've had customers that didn't buy from me because I was straightforward about what the lineage was on the parents. And I've had other people that have cut me off when I start telling them what the lineage is.

They're like, I really don't care. I just really like the snake. That's cool. Yeah, just be honest and don't, you know, say what you have. That's really the point I want to get across here. Just be honest about what it is. Yeah, because if you would have told the people what they wanted to hear that they come up i'm looking for this lineage oh i've got it right here and then they find out no this wasn't what he said it was you know it

it didn't have the gene or it wasn't head albino or whatever you know i had some ruthven's king snakes that i got and i i bred them a couple years no albinos they were supposed to be head albino you know so i got taken but guess what they were cool snakes i think i'd like years. No albinos. They were supposed to be head albino, you know. So I got taken. But guess what? They were cool snakes. I think I'd like the non-albinos better than I would the albinos these days. So, you know, just be honest in what you're doing. I like that.

It's a good point. I've probably talked myself out of more sales than I'd like to admit due to either lineage or the infamous, hey, this is what a jag is and what can possibly happen and all that. But, you know, I really, I'm taking that point to heart where I want to be honest about what my animals are and what can happen and where they came from and all that. And, you know, then let the person make that decision. That's, that's the best you can do, you know, and not be shady. Yeah. Yeah. Well, well, good. Yeah. Well said. All right. Well, appreciate you guys coming on. This is a fun topic. Uh, I,

I, yeah. Thanks for, uh, proposing it and coming on so quick too. That was, that was a lot of fun. You want to throw out your information? Tell people where they can find you? Billy? Bill's a celebrity. He can go first. No, no. Oh.

Yeah, I was going to ask when you got more Venom Exchange radio coming out. Listen to that Scorpion guy. I was like, man, maybe I want to keep Scorpions. That was a cool show. Horrible. I know. So bad. guy i was like man maybe i want to keep scorpions that was pretty yeah that was a cool show horrible i know so bad spent hours after that just scrolling that website that he yeah threw out there oh yeah the polish website oh man and then i started going through old facebook photos i'm like no i don't need this again yeah too many deli cups you you've got the best voice for podcasting, I swear. I enjoy all your podcasts. You do a great job, man.

Make this guy blush. I like his Christmas video. You guys saw the Christmas video? Reading the Carpet Python book? Was that the one? Yeah, when he's in the robe and stuff. The palm tree. We were supposed to do a better one this year. We all forgot.

That's funny. But yes, you can find me, nobtails.ig on Instagram and at the Herpetoculture Network, Snakes and Stogies Monday night and Venom Exchange Radio, wherever you can find podcasts. Nipper's very, very busy. I'm very, very busy. And we've been trying to do a lot of international guests. So like pegging down the time, it's so hard. But we've got like eight or nine people lined up.

We just got to record. So it's going to be a few more weeks until we get another one out. But sooner than later. That's cool. Now, why aren't you going local? I mean, there's lots of cool venomous snakes in the U.S. and in Europe. There is. local i mean there's lots of cool venomous snakes in the u.s and in europe there is and the problem is that nipper and i wanted to find people that aren't necessarily in the limelight who are doing really really awesome work and kind of get them some exposure and we really wanted to talk to

people that are in areas that that don't get all the fame like everyone and their mother goes to costa rica you know i mean that's great it's awesome because rica's a magical place but that don't get all the fame. Like everyone and their mother goes to Costa Rica. You know what I mean? That's great. It's awesome. Costa Rica is a magical place, but I need to find the undergrad student in Morocco who's, who's studying vipers that no one's ever heard of. But I'm,

but I'm going to Costa Rica in November. So I want to hear from that Costa Rica guy. Okay. Okay. Fair enough. Get him on soon. Yeah. I've got,

we've got a lot of international people lined up. We're going to get some breeders in, too. There's some guys in the UK that are really producing some awesome stuff. It's just a matter of time. I'm really enjoying it, though. Even though I don't keep venomous, I may never keep venomous in the future. I kept a couple rattlesnakes as a kid, but I just love listening to them. It's cool stuff.

Dude, herping with you, man, no one finds more rattlesnakes than Dr. Drew Langer. Flat out. Chuck aced me on that price. Justin just almost steps on them. He's almost tripping over them. Just whether they decide to alert me or not. Yeah, I just heard a guy who shouldn't have good hearing happened to still have good hearing happened to still

have good hearing that's the only reason i i heard that price i yeah right between dustin's feet yeah exactly super envious you guys on this last trip man that was a did you the trifecta no that was it was it was pretty it was that was pretty awesome it really was pretty awesome yeah man right and like there's people that have never done that in their entire life yeah dustin was super super so happy like dude at what we found that he was just and then he was buzzing and muzzing mate buzzing and muzzing oh my god yeah that was fun super cool all right billy how about you? Cool. Yeah. You can find me at Uwabami Reptiles on Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, starting that back up. Nice.

And uwabamireptiles.com. I got a website that has – I'm working on getting some lineage stuff up to kind of go with the episode. It's a slow process but you know doing what i can nice yeah just chip away right got some spectacular uh carpets on there man i i was actually scrolling through your facebook page while we were talking trying to find those jungles and then you showed a picture but i'm i'm just drooling over all these uh coastals they're fantastic yeah i like i love that-Pen, that really light one. That silver and white look, I love that look.

That's so cool. Yeah, I ended up getting a male from that same clutch, secondhand, that he's keeping more of the red color as he's coming into age. So I'm excited to be able to breed them together and get both looks or see how they'll mix or whatever so that's a project i'm really excited very cool yeah mike mike pinnell's a national treasure in my opinion he is absolutely great guy yeah he is definitely cool all right well uh billy you want to tell people about your show that you're doing in the near future oh yeah oh yeah going to

tindley nice yeah i forgot about that going to tindley in a few weeks very cool i was hoping to to make it this year and have have some books at the the show but i don't know if that's going to happen so oh well yeah well if it does i'll be So just saying, you can grab my coffee. Yeah. Well, I'm hoping. Apparently, they're in the port this week. So I don't know how long after they arrive in the port we'll have them. Sometimes they sit there for a month. Other times they're out in a week.

But I'm planning on driving down and picking them up so I can get them out as quickly as possible. It's going to, yeah, there was a copy at the Daytona auction and our buddy clay, um, he got, he's actually a neighbor of mine. Uh, he ended up getting it in the auction and nice,

you know, I didn't want to like spend the whole night on, you know, it's not my book, but the little bit that I thumbed through, like you guys really outdid yourselves. Thanks. So I'm really excited to get my hands on my own copy.

Yeah, I was just happy to have it done in hand. It's really cool to see. I mean, it's fun, you know, it's nice to see it digitally, but there's something about holding it in your hands and flipping through pages. Oh, it is heavy. Oh, is it heavy. You could chug a horse with that book. Home defense reptile book for sure. Yeah, absolutely.

Or a great doorstop, you know, whatever you want to use it for. Oh, man. Much, much, much better than a doorstop. Break your foot on that thing. It was really funny. Like, as the night was winding down, everyone's been drinking, everyone's going back to their hotel room. We all kind of like mosey on into the lobby, and there's still a group of like eight herpers huddled around this one book, the quote-unquote biblical texts, with like a flashlight. And they're like, we've got to read as much as we can before this guy walks away with it. That's awesome.

Yeah, that was really cool to see you guys around the book. Yeah. I mean, that's why you do this, is to get it into people's hands, and hopefully they see what you saw, you know, and agree with what you're putting out there. But, yeah. I'm sure there will be some detractors. I'm curious to hear it. Yeah, it'll be fun.

Well, they can write their own book if they're so concerned about all right well of course thanks to npr for hosting it to the podfather and the mackinwookie you guys are awesome and um keep keep doing what you're doing. Check out all the, uh, NPR podcasts and their website and all that good stuff. And we will catch you again next week for another episode of reptile fight club. I'll send the wolf to kick you in the shin. Thank you.